Disclaimer: Joss Whedon owns every character you recognise. I own the plot. Now enjoy.

A/N: I first have to thank the people who reviewed my story so here goes. They inspired me to carry on with the next chapter so soon.

Jodi: So many people say that my writing so good but I just don't see it. Thank you ever so.

Taintless: Thanx. I wanted to get their characters down.

Connor: I updated soon didn't I? So please don't flame. lol

Tamara: I agree with you in the Dead Things part. Someone should have been there for Spike but then she really didn't do him that much harm right? The way I tried it, I wanted it to be bad. Did it work?

Azuloy: Yes, she should appreciate Spike and the rest of what she has. I completely agree.

Mita427: Does this work for you? You wanted it soon.

Sepakina: Thank you but this was just supposed to be the beginning.

Kelsey: Thank you.

BlueEpiks13: Sorry but Willow and Tara never struck me as the type to hate Spike. They are very forgiving so it won't last long.

Chapter 2: Friends Like These and Rayya Explained.

Buffy shut the door behind her with a great sigh. She wanted to go after her sister but there was no going after her when she was in this mood. Looking at her friends imploringly again, she received another noncommittal glance. Buffy sighed again and said "Was it really that horrible?"

Willow and Tara grimaced at each other and silently made their way to the dining room. Buffy knew that she was obviously meant to follow. Glancing in the living room, she caught sight of Spike sleeping on the couch and his wheelchair beside it. He was badly bruised. With an extremely tiny feeling of guilt, Buffy sat opposite Willow at the dining table.

Willow looked visibly upset. Tara was the first one to speak, albeit uncomfortably. "D-did you r-really do that to him."

Buffy nodded glumly. Willow couldn't not speak anymore and she desperately wanted to find a reason as to why her best friend and the kindest soul she knew would do that. "What did he do to you? Did he hit you first? All Rayya said was that you had beaten him up and as punishment, you were to look after him until he was well enough."

Buffy looked heavenward Thank you ever so Rayya. I at least hoped that you could make this a little easier. Buffy looked at her best friend helplessly. "He didn't do anything Will. I was so upset about Giles leaving and he was just there…"

Buffy wasn't making this sound any less heartless. Willow looked slightly aghast and Tara couldn't hide her feelings either.

"Buffy!" Willow choked out, "Did he even fight back?"

Buffy shook her head and looked down at the wooden surface of the table, determined to avoid eye contact with her friends. "But Dawn"

"Loves Spike" Tara finished. "You know that as well as anybody."

Willow was still shaking her head disbelievingly "He is one of the few men left in her life and you yourself know how much she loves him. Even if you don't."

"He was being his old obnoxious self."

"Yes," nodded Tara, "But you've never beat him so much that he can't even walk before."

"Look," Willow sighed. "I agree with Rayya. You must look after him, even if it's only to redeem yourself."

Tara nodded beside her. Buffy looked up, her expression slightly guarded "Well it's not like you like Spike so why do you think that it's so damn awful? He's a vampire, I'm a vampire Slayer. You do that math."

Tara clamped her mouth shut but Willow wasn't about to take that from her friend and she also wasn't going to get into a fight. "Yes Buffy, he's a vampire but he's a vampire who loves you. A vampire who would never hurt you or leave you, no matter how much you hate him or don't need him. You keep denying it but you know yourself that you can't do everything by yourself. Oh, and for your information. I don't hate Spike. He has risked so much in admitting his love for you. He's alienated all of us at some point of another but he has also, and this may be the most important, alienated himself from his own kind. With the way you treat him, where does he fit in?"

Buffy did not have the words. Willow was right. Why had she never thought what Spike's loving the Slayer would do about his reputation in the demon world. "I didn't…"

Willow shook her head, "Don't, all you can do now is be there for him and could you please, for Dawn, just try and put up with him? You're not even alone in this. You have Tara, Dawn and I to help you. Oh, and Xander knows too. Dawn called and told him."

Buffy nodded. She wasn't too apprehensive about Xander finding out, he didn't like Spike anyway. "Right. Um, what did he say to you? Spike I mean."

Tara said "He didn't say anything. He was asleep when Rayya brought him here and he hasn't stirred at all."

"So he doesn't know that he's going to stay with us then?" Buffy asked confused.

"He knows." Willow said matter-of-factly. I imagine Rayya told him. Well that's what she said.

"Oh" a thought came to Buffy. "Who is she?"

"Who, Rayya?" Tara asked. Buffy nodded. "She's an immortal witch. More precisely, she's the daughter of Hecate, the first ever known witch. Rayya is the most powerful and good witch to ever grace this Earth. Her powers are the true essence of magic and her job is to show the path of truth, which I guess is what she's doing with you and Spike.

When witches perform spells, they call upon Hecate as she is the power behind most of the spells. The other spells call upon Aradia, her sister."

Buffy nodded, she remembered both of these names being mentioned when Willow or Tara did a spell. "If he hasn't woken up yet, are you sure that he's ok?"

"Well Rayya would have told us if there was anything else needed so I guess that we just have to wait until he wakes up." Willow shrugged. "Do you have any idea where Dawn could have gone?"

"I'm guessing Xander's or Janice's. Xander's most likely, seeing that he knows Spike. God!" Buffy cried, putting her head in her hands. "She must hate me right now."

"Yes" Tara said soothingly, which didn't seem particularly appropriate at this moment. "But she'll get over it. When she sees that Spike doesn't hate you at all."

Buffy looked sceptically at her friends. At that precise moment, they heard a bang and a vehement exclamation of "Oh bloody hell!"

Willow and Tara quickly got up and headed for the living room. Buffy stayed by for a minute, not knowing if she could face him. Deciding that she could, she stood up. Just then, the front door opened and in came Xander, Anya and Dawn. Buffy rolled her eyes and proceeded to the living room. Xander, Anya and Dawn got there first and Buffy rounded the corner just in time to see Willow, Tara and Xander helping Spike back onto the couch.

All she could think was oh no, Xander doesn't hate Spike!

Dawn sat beside Spike. "Do you want to sit here or in that wheelchair?" She asked, eyeing the wheelchair with distaste. Spike eyed it with equal distaste. "I am not getting into that thing again! I have had enough of it. Reminds me of the bloody poof and the last time I was in one."

Dawn grinned. "You can sit here if you want. Why did you fall off?"

Spike managed the best blush that a vampire with no circulation could produce. "I forgot that my legs don't work."

Dawn nodded knowingly and shot Buffy the dirtiest look she could muster. Xander walked up to Buffy, took her by the shoulders and lead her out of the room. "Buffy, I'm not going to lecture you because I know that you've had enough and I am not going to slap you because I can still see Dawn's handprint on your face but I am not going to say that I am happy with what you did or that he deserved it. I hear the he told you he wasn't going to fight back?"

Buffy nodded solemnly.

"Well I have come to accept the fact that Spike loves you. I mean I accept the fact that he's in love with you. Buffy, you can't help who you fall in love with, trust me. It's not always going to be immediate but it will happen. Time is a great healer. Hold on to that knowledge and treat him well while he gets better."

Buffy looked scandalised. "I thought that you hated him. You always said that you did. Evil undead, Captain Peroxide. Remember those unique names that you gave him?"

Xander nodded. "Don't take the offensive with me Buff. Spike has saved my life more times than I can count. I'm not saying that I'm happy about his love, I just said that I accept it. Just like my friends accepted Anya…and her money."

Buffy smiled at him. "Thanks Xand. This helps."

Xander nodded. "Do you want me to take Anya, Willow and Tara out so that you and The Dawnster can talk?"

Buffy nodded. "I don't like fighting with my sister. Especially since she's the only family that I have left."

Xander had taken them all out of the house, leaving the sisters and the vampire. Buffy re-entered the living room to catch some more of the conversation.

"The bruises look bad Spike." Dawn said sadly.

"Scar tissue Dawn, it all heals. Vampire healing remember, so I should be clear in about a week."

 Dawn caught sight of her sister in the corner of her eye and pointedly turned away so that she couldn't see her anymore. Spike was too intuitive to miss this. He looked Dawn squarely in the eyes and said "Don't let me come between you two, Bit. You only have each other as family in the world now and I'm not worth you doing this to her." Buffy stood awkwardly in the doorway. "Talk to her, sort this out. I don't feel any differently for her and neither should you. Now go." Dawn frowned, hugged Spike lightly and stood up. Crossing her arms across her chest, she walked past Buffy and into the dining room, taking up the place that Willow had been in.

"Dawn…" Buffy began but Dawn cut her off.

"No Buffy, this time you listen to me. I love Spike. He's the closest thing I have to a brother and when you were dead, he took it upon himself to fulfil his promise to you to protect me. No one was allowed to baby-sit me but him" Dawn grimaced at the word baby-sit, she didn't need it in her opinion. "You had absolutely no right but if Spike can forgive, I don't think he ever hated you for it, even breaking his legs, then I guess that it isn't my place to hate you.

I'm warning you Buffy, if you hurt him again, with no serious provocation…I'll never forgive you, even if he does."

Buffy nodded. "So I'm forgiven?"

Dawn nodded, "But I stand by the slap because you definitely deserved it."

Buffy laughed softly. "So do you think it's safe for me to enter the living room again?"

"Don't see why not" Dawn shrugged. "He doesn't think any less of you. Still loves you with everything he possesses. Can't see why though." Dawn grinned. "I'm off out okay? I have school to go to. We started late today, just in case you were about to jump back onto that high horse."

Buffy hugged her sister, gave Dawn her lunch and sent her on her way. She then dragged her feet into the living room. She was more afraid of properly seeing the damage that she had inflicted on the vampire than what he would say to her. As she appeared in the doorway Spike said "I'll put a paper bag over it if it'll help you face me, if you want."

Damn his intuitiveness.

Buffy looked into his face and breathed a sigh of relief. The swelling had gone down, the blood had been washed away but the bruises looked as bad as ever, if not worse. She could revel in the fact that at least he didn't look as bad as he had when he had been tortured by Glory.

She shook her head and sat next to him. "I apologise Spike. I shouldn't have done it. I had no place."

Spike shrugged and turned the TV on. "You had to vent and you did. Besides, it's not the first time I've been beaten up." He contemplated "It is the first time I've had my legs broken though and my spine damaged."

Buffy closed her eyes in pain. Why did she have to behave so stupidly all the time?

"Slayer, it'll heal in a few weeks and then I'll be gone so don't worry about it ok?"

Buffy shook her head and looked into his ice blue eyes. "I'm sorry Spike but Rayya said that you can't leave until I accept that your love for me is real and I just can't do that. I can't believe it so you may be here a tad longer than you thought."

Spike stared unconcernedly at the woman he loved and said matter-of-factly. "When I'm healed, I'll walk out of here and I won't come back until you ask of it."

Buffy thought that it might be a bit more difficult than that. She didn't have time to dwell on it though as the rest of the residents of 1630 Revello Drive household returned with lots of laughs and sweet, fatty foods.

*               *               *               *               *               *               *               *               *               *               *               *

The End, of that chapter. LOL

I had to make it short as I have college tomoro. I'll update as soon as I can.

Pure-HP